St George’s North, much of which is a World Heritage site, has been much in the news over the years. Big issues have included the long awaited replacement hotel for the Club Med, the loss of its cruise ship business and a devastated local economy.Residents and business owners in the area are accustomed to its centre as being referred to as a ghost town. And there is a fair amount of disenchantment about the lack of progress to change that perception.“I think it's a constituency that no one’s doing anything for,” said business man Chris West.“I haven’t seen anything done for St George’s through the Government.”Mr West is behind efforts to establish a boutique hotel in the area and believes a marina would also help move things along economically.As far as he is concerned the district is due for a change of representative and he’ll be voting for the Mayor. “To be honest from what I’m hearing in here and I’m hearing it from a whole cross section — they want a change,” he said.“I mean we’ve got a town full of people out of work. Walk down the street and you see all the shops are closed.”Mr West believes that the tourism focus had shifted from St George’s to Dockyard.“Locals used to come here. They would come down and do shopping and such but everything’s closed. There’s no attraction to come here.”Mr West once ran the beach bar concession at Fort St Catherine but that was demolished with the old Club Med hotel more than three years ago.But ground is yet to be broken for a new Park Hyatt hotel planned as its replacement. “I don’t think anyone in St George’s believes it is going to happen,” said Mr West who suspects that developer Carl Bazarian is speculating and may end up selling off his lease for the property at a profit when the economy turns.“St Georgians have in the past had the luxury of being able to work in St George’s when there was a hotel, and there has been no hotel for some time,” said the PLP’s Dame Jennifer Smith.“So that luxury does not exist anymore and that’s what Government has been concentrating on in terms of trying to find the right fit for the World Heritage site.”Dame Jennifer said that for most of the constituents she has canvassed, the hotel is not the top concern.“If you ask them what’s your desire, what would be the best thing that can happen then they would say a hotel for St George’s because that generates activity and it generates jobs and it just helps to revitalise the entire town, even if that’s not your area of work. But that is not the first thing that most people say. It would be jobs and public safety.”Her challenger Mayor Kenneth Bascome, standing for the OBA, told the news media at his unveiling that the hotel developer Carl Bazarian had made a commitment to him that he would deliver the hotel.One resident, a business owner who did not want to be named said that the impact of the downturn was becoming more noticeable in the conditions of students in the area school.“I think there’s genuine hardship going on,” she said. “There’s more and more people looking down and out.”She added: “I think it’s really sad. It’s got the potential to be fabulous. It was fabulous.”Philip Anderson, a ruling party supporter, admitted that the district was “not much better” off than it was since the 2007 election.But he said the expansion of the franchise for municipal elections was one major step forward. “That definitely is an accomplishment than what we had five years ago.”And he said he was confident that the hotel will be built or “the government will continue to move forward to find another developer.”Mr Anderson is also hoping that a solution will be find to accommodate larger cruise ships in St George’s but said there was strong opposition to widening Town Cut.“What we do know is internationally that the cruise ship industry is moving away from the smaller ships.”He is offended by those who claim that the Government has ignored the area. “Dr Ewart Brown came here many years ago and wanted to widen that channel and the municipality rejected that. Now they’re claiming that the Government neglected them.”As for the quality of the candidates, Mr Anderson said that there could be no one more dedicated to the area than Dame Jennifer while the Mayor’s only legacy had been a couple of speed bumps and had failed to provide leadership on issues like widening the Town Cut channel.The Municipality, he said, was blaming the Government for its own failures.Public safety has also emerged as a major issue in the years since the last election. But while some residents might no longer be surprised by antisocial behaviour, “the tourists are picking up on that. When they come they ask is it safe to walk around Tobacco Bay? Is it safe to go to the Unfinished Church.”Mr Bascome is also promising constituents a fully functioning police station and a fully functioning fire station. But no one mentioned those when we did a random walkabout through the old town.Dame Jennifer said that she had not heard such concerns on the doorstep but that the Governor has been approached about a police station.“Government cannot tell the Police how to operate operationally, and the Mayor should know that and I’m assuming that he does know that,” she said.“And I believe he knows that because he himself has spoken to the Governor about that issue as we have.”She said: “I know we have taken it as far as we can by completely outfitting the property so it can be manned. But those who try to link that to security seem to have forgotten that there were issues on the square only yards from the police station when it was operational.“So it’s not a matter of having somebody in a specific place. It’s a matter of how the police manage their resources. It’s a matter of people roaming the parish and ensuring that people are adhering to the law.“I believe the town had invested in CCTV cameras and I’m not sure if they are operational.”That would be the Mayor’s responsibility.Dame Jennifer has a firm view on widening Town Cut to allow larger cruise ships to visit. The Bermuda National Trust has studied the issue and determined that from an environmental standpoint, it’s not worth it. And the Dame agrees.“Widening the channel and eliminating three islands is not an ecological response and I believe the Minister of Transport is in fact actively looking for an alternative response.“Further I know that current shop owners have noticed the impact of the amount of tourists landing by ferry. And they are quite pleased with that. But they notice that St George’s in actual fact is not quite ready to take on much larger numbers than that at one time.”She said: “We need to focus on cultural tourism that is people who are coming there to see our fortifications and our 17th century living town as opposed to people who may be looking for more activity offered by Hamilton for instance.”But Dame Jennifer noted that a growing number of artists and entrepreneurs were being attracted to St George’s and had set up shop there.Redrawn boundaries, which came into effect when the election writ was dropped, saw St George’s North lose a cluster of islands, notably Smiths Island, and 19 voters, to St George’s South — changes which could make a difference to the election results, given the district’s marginality.Dame Jennifer says she probably had just one or two voters on Smiths Island who had now been moved to St George’s South.But little else changes. The district’s new boundaries continue to take in the Town of St George, home to more than 100 businesses and dozens of private residences, as well as the residential areas off Barrack Hill, Cut Road and Coot Pond Road.“They run the gamut. There’s no way you can stand at a polling station in St George’s and not realise its diversity,” said Dame Jennifer.But in many respects the district’s demographic make up reflects the rest of the Island.It mirrors the Island in terms of the racial identity of Bermudians 16 years and over in 2010, with 64 percent reporting that they were black and 21 percent saying they were white, when the latest Census was taken.In terms of household income range, the district’s 622 households mirror the nation except for the highest income band — those earning $144,000 and more. Twenty nine percent of households in the district are in the highest income bracket, compared to 35 percent Island-wide.But the data also suggests that St George’s North constituents could use a little extra help in certain areas. The district ranked eighth from the bottom in median household income and was the district with the highest number of unemployed people, when Census 2010 was taken.Constituents also lag behind many other districts in terms of educational attainment.It came fifth in the number of qualified voters (320) who reported that they had no formal educational qualifications, directly behind its neighbours St George’s West (328) and St David’s (353). That ranking is topped by district 32, Southampton West (381) and district 21, Pembroke South East (434).And St George’s North ranked seventh from the bottom in the number of voting age Bermudians who listed a university degree as their highest academic qualification (133), compared to district 16, Pembroke East Central which at 75 ranked last, and Paget West which topped the list at 380.